Thread by @DavidLat

1/ Assuming even the partial accuracy of what @aaronsibarium just wrote (apparently based in part on leaked audio), what's going on at Yale Law School is deeply disturbing.

bit.ly/3DDr6V2

2/ You don't need to be a Federalist Society fan to be troubled by what reportedly happened at YLS.

See, e.g., @mjs_DC—definitely no @FedSoc fan—who explains why handling such situations in this way is actually counterproductive:

https://twitter.com/mjs_DC/status/1448318051401838592

3/ I am in no way blind to the Federalist Society's faults. After January 6, I wrote a few thousand words that were quite critical of @FedSoc.

bit.ly/3pbDiFL

4/ Despite the faults of the Federalist Society, I do not believe that mere membership in @FedSoc should be "triggering" or "oppressive" to law students.

https://twitter.com/nickconfessore/status/1448300485283287040

5/ And I think that when law students disagree or get offended by other students, they should work it out amongst themselves, without the administration (absent extreme circumstances, e.g., harassment or threats).

6/ I believe this regardless of the politics of the parties involved. For example, Stanford Fed Soc shouldn't have complained about @n1n2w3; they should have just responded with humor or mockery of their own.

7/ As a @YaleLawSch alum, I just sent Dean @GerkenHeather an email "putting in a good word" for freedom of expression and intellectual diversity at the law school (which maybe one shouldn't have to do, but this is academia in 2021).

8/ I just received the following statement from Yale Law School (@YaleLawSch), which emphasizes YLS's "strong free speech protections" and states that no investigation was initiated (unlike that @StanfordLaw situation a few months ago):

9/ I'm listening to the audio now (via @aaronsibarium).

Around 7:15, diversity director Yaseen Eldik does acknowledge that student complaints were filed (but again, no investigation has been—or could be—launched).

bit.ly/2YOQ7gY

10/ At 16:45, Eldik says "this isn't adjudicatory" and "isn't going beyond the [YLS] community."

But in the student's defense, I can understand why a stern talking-to by two administrators might FEEL adjudicatory (if we're going to let feelings rule).

11/ What I don't like about the audio is, well, how perfectly it reflects where we are in 2021. At times it sounds like a parody of political correctness.

People get offended by the smallest things these days. And I'm not sure if or how we can change that.

12/ Clearly some students were subjectively offended by the email. And I think the administrators were genuinely trying to explain to the sender why some took offense.

But I do wish people would be less quick to take offense these days.

13/ Some additional background.

One source of mine, a woman of color at Yale Law School, told me that the sender is a “really nice kid and a student rep—they tried to get him removed. The email was kinda dumb, but I think he was just trying to be funny.”

14/ Added my source about the sender of the Yale Law School email, “Plus he’s also one of the only actual, very visible Native American students here too.”

As you can tell from the audio (below), this fact definitely helped him.

bit.ly/2YOQ7gY

15/ Yale Law School sources tell me Dean @GerkenHeather and other YLS administrators are getting flak from some students for NOT investigating or disciplining the sender of that @YaleLawSch email.

Wow, I do not want to be a university administrator in 2021.

16/ We come at this from different places, but I agree with @mjs_DC's ultimate conclusion:

"Law schools should not get involved over student disputes over protected speech. Doing so does not help the speaker, or their critics, or the school itself."

17/ And here is @mjs_DC's close:

"[F]ormal intervention only makes matters worse for all parties. Law students are adults. When their schools treat them like children, they are inviting nothing but pain."

bit.ly/3DDXFSK

18/ Here's my detailed, not-very-hot take on "Trap House-gate," the latest free-speech controversy to rock Yale Law School.

As I said earlier, I'm troubled by what went down at YLS. But the issue here is bigger than any one email.

bit.ly/3DKcWl4

19/ If you've been following the "trap house" email controversy at Yale Law School, this article by @aaronterr1 of @TheFIREorg is a must-read.

Terr interviews the sender of the email. The situation is worse than many of us realized.

bit.ly/3p5blSM

20/ Here is a column from @RuthMarcus of the @washingtonpost about the Yale Law email controversy:

wapo.st/3aIeu2c

21/ For those of you who might have missed it but are following this thread, here's the latest development.

Other Yale Law School students are trying to get Trent Colbert ousted as a student government representative. Thread:

https://twitter.com/DavidLat/status/1449049740658806791

22/ In response to all the "what is up with these Yale law students" tweets:

I'm in touch with several YLS students, including students of color and Black students. Some of them strongly disagree with their classmates who are angry at Trent Colbert.

23/ I encourage Yale Law students who want to share their views to contact me.

I welcome hearing from all students at YLS, including students who were offended by the email or want Trent removed.

My email is at the top of this post: bit.ly/3DKcWl4

24/ Some readers have asked me: did you reach out to Yale BLSA for comment?

Yes. Yesterday I emailed the president/chair, inviting her to issue a statement or be interviewed by me. I haven't heard back yet, but I hope I will.

25/ Another source sent me this GQ article by @arcwrites, "Why the Popeyes Chicken Sandwich Craze Quickly Morphed into Black Shaming."

I stand by the points in my original post. But I thank this reader for the helpful context.

bit.ly/3DHewEb

26/ We all need to do a better job of listening to each other.

It might not change our bottom line (reading the GQ article didn't change mine), but it will help us to understand different points of view.

27/ Here is an excellent thread by @monicacbell, a member of the Yale Law School faculty, defending the YLS administration’s handling of the trap-house email incident. It’s thoughtful and fair-minded, and I think it would be hard to come up with better.

https://twitter.com/monicacbell/status/1449124183124938753

28/ Going back to my original article (linked in tweets 18 and 23 above), I’m less concerned about the specifics of this case, including the email, and more concerned about the process we use for resolving future disputes.

29/ I hope YLS will consider my idea of a meet-and-confer between students as a prerequisite before students can get administrative remedies (pun intended). Cf. an exhaustion requirement.

30/ It doesn’t even have to be an official requirement; it can simply be informal, applied in practice.

When the administration gets a complaint of offensive speech, they ask the complainant: what have you done to try and work this out already?

31/ Had the offended students gone out to pizza with Trent Colbert and shared points like the ones raised by @monicacbell in her thread, maybe they’d have gotten a sincere apology, in organic fashion (no pressure), and this all could have been avoided.

32/ I interviewed Trent Colbert, the 2L at Yale Law School who sent the email in question, as well as a friend of his who's a fellow @YaleLawSch student.

bit.ly/3B1BkNj